Southern Railway mazdoor union protests move to hand over express train routes to private entities

It will only favour the private operators, they say

Condemning the move to hand over the express train routes to private entities, railway employees affiliated to Southern Railway Mazdoor Union staged a demonstration here on Tuesday.

They said the railways had identified 109 pairs of routes in 12 clusters to allow private players to operate train services and fix their own fares. “Most of these routes are profit making for the railways and the decision will only favour the private operators,” they said and strongly condemned move to hand over the train service between Coimbatore and Shirdi under the ‘Bharat Gaurav’ scheme. The fare for the train service was twice that of the usual fare, they claimed and blamed the railways for allowing private operators to collect excess charge from the passengers.

Members also condemned the proposed Shri Ramayana Yatra tourist train service from New Delhi to Nepal that will be operated by the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) from June 21. “In the name of promoting tourism, the Central government had sold the train to IRCTC,” they charged and wanted only the Indian Railways to operate trains.

They said that the centre’s move to operate 100 ‘Bharat Gaurav’ trains was nothing but privatisation of railways that would have a long-term negative impact on the country. The government was in a hurry to sell national assets that were built in the last 75 years.